


Call Me Wild

by bar2d2s



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: M/M, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension, everyone is tense and suffering, this...might qualify as fetish I just realized
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-24
Updated: 2018-04-24
Packaged: 2019-04-27 05:03:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14418264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bar2d2s/pseuds/bar2d2s
Summary: As it so happens? Zeb CAN be more attracted to the weird fleshy thing he picked up on an icy moon.Set between Zero Hour and In the Name of the Rebellion.





	Call Me Wild

Zeb sat hunched over on the bunk in his quarters on Yavin IV, elbows on his knees as his fingers tried to massage away the image so thoroughly imprinted in his brain. Not that it was an unpleasant image, mind you, just a very, very distracting one.

He’d been walking through the base’s main hanger, normal. He did that ten, twelve times a day. This time, he was specifically looking for Wedge, to deliver a new mission order from the top. Hera had managed to convince the council that the goofy kid was competent and serious enough to work infiltration, get out a few spies they had in an academy on Coruscant. No one would recognize him that far in-rim, and he knew the inner workings of academy life fairly well. A bit more important, but still. Normal. Wedge had been deep in conversation with Kallus. That bordered on unusual. Kallus tended to avoid other Imperial defectors even though, frankly, he’d be safe as houses with them. It was the folks who’d always been rebels that he’d be wise to watch out for.

But yes. Kallus. Talking. He had laughed at something Wedge said. Wedge had taken a step back in surprise, bumping into a tech that was in the midst of lighting up a cigarra. This caused the poor, foolish girl to drop her lighter almost directly into a small pool of oil, immediately setting it ablaze.

Before Zeb could even react, Kallus had torn off his jacket, throwing it on the fire and stamping it out. He then proceeded to chew out the tech for smoking in a non-smoking area, “We have the bloody signs posted for a  _reason_  someone could have been  _killed_ -” confiscated her pack of smokes, and sent her on her way. He then turned and spotted Zeb, his face taking on that warm half-smile he seemed to reserve specifically for him. But Zeb was frozen in place.

He’d assumed that Kallus’ shirt beneath his jacket was long-sleeved. It was not. He’d also assumed that Kallus’ shirt was a good sight looser than it turned out to be. So there Kallus stood, chest still heaving slightly from the stamping and the yelling, in his obscenely tight,  _short-sleeved_  shirt, bicep tightening a bit as he raised one arm to wave Zeb over.

“Garazeb!” He called, unconsciously straightening a lock of hair that had fallen out of place. “Playing errand boy for Hera again?” Kallus asked, eyeing the datapad.

“Uh.” Zeb brilliantly replied, trying to rake his eyes down Kallus’ exposed arms and torso as subtly as possible. From the way the half-smile pinched itself into a small smirk, he was clearly failing.

“What’s on the pad, Garazeb?” Kallus asked, voice low and smooth. Zeb bit back what would have been a strangled scream, practically throwing the datapad at Wedge and hurrying away.

And now here he sat. Alone, emotionally compromised, and squirming with a guilty sort of want every time he remembered, he remembered...

Kallus had  _fur_.

Light brown, soft-looking fur, all up and down his bare arms. It wasn’t quite as dense as his own, and it was much sparser on his upper arms and biceps than it was on his forearms, but it was  _there_.

It was a headrush, seeing a human with fur somewhere other than their head. Twi’leks and Togruta were completely hairless by some cruel design of nature, but they seemed to get along well enough without. Kanan was capable of growing a beard, but he’d seen the man fresh from the bacta tank. Furless. Ezra never seemed capable of growing even the simplest of facial hair, and his body was always eerily smooth, as well. Sabine would sometimes come to breakfast in her sleep clothes, and the stubble he’d spot beneath her arms and on her legs meant that while she  _could_  grow fur, she voluntarily shaved it off, which was somehow  _worse_. The clones could grow various kinds of facial and head hair, but he’d never seen it on their arms, or chests.

 _Karabast_. What if Kallus had fur on his  _chest_?!

With a pitiful moan, Zeb collapsed backwards onto his bed. That was a dangerous line of thinking. Kallus had been attractive enough already, with those glorious sideburns. Even when they’d hated each other, Zeb had been fascinated by them. He’d never met another Imperial that paid such care when it came to maintaining distinct facial hair. And then Kallus had defected and...the beard began. He wasn’t quite there, the hair on his chin growing at easily three times the rate of the hair around his mouth. But he didn’t seem to be shaving anymore, though his sideburns and beard were still well-groomed. They added a new layer to his facial expressions.

Like when he  _smirked_.

Zeb groaned again, less pitiful and more pained, but smothered it when he picked up the sound of boots near his door. Moments later, a knock.

“Zeb?”  _Nope_. He wasn’t in. He was most definitely not in. “I know you’re in there, I can hear you panicking.”  _Karabast_.

With all the enthusiasm of a man on his way to the gallows, Zeb pulled himself out of bed, trudging the few feet between the bunk and the door to let his friend in. Kallus had his arms crossed, but he didn’t look angry, or worried. His eyes held a certain degree of amusement, though over what, Zeb didn’t know. His arms were still bare and this close, the fur there looked like it was just as well-groomed as Kallus’ sideburns and beard. Silky. Zeb swallowed.

“I should apologize, for the hangar.” He said, as soon as Zeb had stepped to the side to allow him entrance. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m afraid I’m not very good at, ah, friendly banter.” Zeb remembered the set of Kallus’ mouth, the tone of his voice. The way his eyes had dropped from his face to his hand and back again, scanning Zeb as thoroughly as Zeb had been scanning him.

The whole scene had been  _distinctly_  flirtatious if you’d asked him, but maybe Zeb was just bad at reading signals.

“Nah you, eh. You didn’t do nothin’ wrong. I was just surprised at,” He gestured at Kallus’ arms, which tensed on reflex. And stars, did Imperial conditioning make for a nice set of biceps. “Never seen a human with fur before.”

Kallus flushed, dropping his arms to his sides before recrossing them over his chest, then dropping them again. Though he was trying not to stare, the constant movement of Kallus’ arms caused his shirt to strain a little. Apparently Imperial conditioning also did wonders for the pectorals. Zeb’s mouth went dry, and he coughed. 

It was an incredibly awkward moment for the both of them, but they powered through it.

“It’s genetic.” Kallus mumbled, his nose and ears pink. “My father’s side of the family was quite...hirsute. I had an uncle that always looked like he was wearing a jumper, even when shirtless.” Zeb’s entire body twitched. It wasn’t quite confirmation, but- “I don’t have it quite so bad. My b-  _fur_  is much thinner and less...all-encompassing than his was.”

So there were parts of Kallus that didn’t have fur, he could work with that. Easily.

 _He is your friend_. His brain helpfully reminded him, and Zeb turned a snarl into a grin. “Ah, no one’s perfect.” He joked, then winced as Kallus’ face fell. “I mean, I shed. At least you don’t shed.” That brought forth a surprised laugh. “You know how many drains I’ve clogged? You don’t  _wanna_  know!” Kallus had his hand clapped over his mouth, trying desperately to keep his helpless giggling to a minimum. Oh no, not on Zeb’s watch. “I mean, look at this!” He said, partially unzipping the front of his jumpsuit. “You wondered why I didn’t freeze on Bahryn? Insulation!”

But Kallus wasn’t laughing anymore. Instead, he was staring at Zeb, eyes tracing the dark stripes on his torso. His tongue darted out wetting his lower lip, and Zeb almost whimpered. And then Kallus was rucking up his own shirt to around his armpits, seemingly hesitant to take it off entirely. Not that it mattered because... _oh_.

Kallus had a fine trail of fur that either lead downwards into his pants, or rose up from them. Zeb would need to properly investigate at some point. His abdomen wasn’t as tightly ridged as it might have been in his younger years, but he still had a relatively flat stomach, which was also somewhat hairy. His chest though, that was the masterpiece, with defined pectorals that were absolutely  _covered_  in fur, though it seemed to be as well-groomed as his facial hair.

He wanted to  _touch_.

“Kal, we’ve got a situation with one of your spies in the Coruscant academy, get to the transmission room as soon as possible.”

Hera was a professional mood-killer, and as soon as he heard her voice over the comm attached to his belt, Kallus yanked down his shirt as if she was standing behind him.

“Of course, be there momentarily, Captain.” He said, still flushed and flustered. It was a good look on him. “I should-” Zeb snapped back to focus, realizing he was being directly addressed.

“Oh! Yeah, yeah you should.” He paused before he’d fully zipped up his jumpsuit, grinning at Kallus with all the teeth he could muster. “Continue this some other time?”

Zeb had no idea what  _this_  he was even referring to, but the suggestion caused the human’s face to go bright red.

“ _Yes_.” He replied, breathless, before turning and striding out of the room. His gait was a tad off, and Zeb chuckled to himself.

If this was the kind of  _friendly behavior_  he’d be getting from Kallus now that he was a rebel, then he was  _definitely_  glad to have recruited him.


End file.
